I think both fitness and business. Fitness because it's an easy way to check stats on the fly without breaking your rhythm or having to fumble with a larger device. Business because you can check your messages in a meeting more discreetly than pulling out your phone and being a distraction.Reply

Fitness for sure. People including myself for a time, use iPods for fitness purposes. Whether it is for use as a pedometer, GPS, talk on the phone(?!), or what have you, people love to bring technology along for the ride... or run. Having information... eh hem... at hand seems like a no-brainer for a lot of people.Reply

If the capabilities of wearables improves to being a standalone phone, that would create a valid value proposition for consumers. There's a market for people who desire a stripped down smartphone in a watch form which can be configured (adding apps, customizing themes) on their computer. As it exists now, wearables only have appeal I think in fitness and healthcare. Reply

I'll have to say Biometrics/Fitness will be the be the area wearables excel. While being Dick Tracy is cool and all. the amount of function able to be backed into such a device is immeasurable. Imagine being in a hospital and only have to wear a watch instead of the dozens of tubes and wires to monitor your vitals.Reply

The most obvious answer is fitness, since that is where they have gained the most traction so far. For example, I currently use my Pebble in conjunction with Runkeeper and Pandora to manage my pace and listen to music while I run.Reply

Wearables and home automation seem to go hand in hand. I would love to be laying in bed and starting my coffee on my watch. NFC would also find a much healthier home on smartwatches as it takes the step of getting your phone from your pocket out of the equation. Health seems to be the focus right now, but I don't see that being a huge selling point (at least in the U.S.) The world can definitely benefit, though, from a watch that notifies you when you are being unhealthy, like just a simple calories burned vs. calories consumed for the day. Reply

Smart watches can be very useful for exercise (step and calorie counters, heart rate sensor, timers for routines, GPS while biking, etc.). I also think they'd be great for home automation, controlling lights, temp, door locks, garage door, etc.Reply

Watches are still viewed as a fashion accessory, regardless of how "smart" they get. I think the most successful watch implementation will be one which combines the aesthetics/design/elegance of a traditional watch with the "smart" features being a bonus. Among the latter, the most important ones for me would be fitness tracking & personal identification applications (ID card replacement, phone unlock, etc..)Reply

Health/Fitness will be a big market for small wearables. Notifications will be next, but I think a true drop-in replacement for a standard watch will be required before notifications really takes off.Reply

In any case, I'm excited about the possibilities for navigation while biking. I've a terrible sense of direction and being able to safely and effectively navigate while cycling around the city would be marvelous. Further, having to pull my phone out less frequently seems really nice.

Once we have cheaper, smaller, more power efficient sensors embedded in everything, the prospects for healthcare are also great. The ability to *reliably* track things like heart rate, blood sugar, blood pressure, and other physiological features will be amazing—given Moore's law and ~big data~ I expect that we'll see a large jump in diagnostic capabilities resulting in earlier, better treatment.Reply

Security should play a pretty large role, as a watch would be something that you always have on you (it could also go multiple layers deep, if needed: randomized token number, password, certificate stored on watch). I think fitness / geolocation will play a pretty large part as well, but I think it will evolve in the future to be un-thethered so there will be no need to also carry a phone around will on a run, hike, bike ride, etc.Reply

I think wearable makers need to take fashion more into consideration. Google has started to do it with Glass, but I don't really like any of the watches so far. Moto 360 is ok, but not really that great.Reply

Healthcare. Having non-contact interaction is a must though. Need to be able to swipe over the phone(whole palmn) for it to display and basic finger motion(scroll up/down/left/right with a single finger). Developers can then tie into GPS to know what room they are in and give full access to all patient information at a glance while allowing hands to be completely free. That's the big deal, glanceable info. Software needs to be location sensitive to give top information without any interaction.Reply

Health/fitness is probably the first market, followed by communications. I'd love to see this evolve to handle speakerphone duties for a dump phone hidden in a pocket or backpack. Displaying texts would be nice, but responding to them could be hard unless voice recognition improves. :)

Honestly, I think fitness is the biggest sector. I'd love one of these to run with. That said, I hope future AW watches have stand alone functionality with a built in GPS and ability to play music. I'd love to go run with JUST this and still be able to track everything. For now tho, the watch paired with my phone would make things easier.Reply

I think a useful but slightly niche application would be in security. It would be a very handy way of providing 2 factor authentication and typically such an app would be useful with only minimal interaction. Hit button receive code.Reply

Aside from the obvious benefit in health, security is actually a great use for wearables. It would allow a team of guards to track other guards on their watch for instance to more effectively coordinate.Reply

I would like one. One segment I haven't heard about would be first responders. I would like to know where my firefighters are inside that building, just in case. I think a smart watch might make a good near-field tracking device.Reply

I think chemical industry is a great growth sector. In a lot of labs you can not take off your gloves to pull your phone out and look at it but you can glance at your wrist. A watch capable of showing not only current time but also that relays the NFPA 704 for the tank closest to you as well as can relay any emergency announcements could be use. Imagine a nearby reactor is going to be put online in 2 hours. Having the ability to broadcast this to every employee before hand could save a lot of workers in chemical factories.Reply

For the near future, I think the main use case for wearables is fitness and adventure. GPS watches like the Forerunner/Fenix are already a success. A GPS watch that can show you a credible topo map, do more sophisticated navigation, download facts about where you're going, do more sophisticated things with your activity tracking, etc could be a Big Deal.

For many of the other things people seem to aim wearables at, I have a hard time seeing the appeal until vastly improved battery life, on-device voice recognition (no wait for upload to google's servers), and a host of other huge changes occur.Reply

Healthcare - I'd like it to check my pulse/heart rate.Security - Would love for my wearable to sound off if my alarm system went off at home or in my car.Fashion - Round watches seem to be more popular than square.Reply

health and fitness are obvious areas where this wearable device could succeed. Security would be interesting as I hate carrying around key chains in my pockets. I would also be excited about calendaring functions, meeting invite reminders, any maybe even important notifications.Reply

I think smart watches will continue to be a niche product until they really crack the fashion aspect of it. It looks like the moto 360 has some potential here, but it will really only take off if it becomes "cool" to have one, which unfortunately seems to be mostly driven by fashion right now. Reply

Location/GPS with navigation/Altitude/Barometric pressure/Compass for use in hiking/climbing would get me back to wearing a watch. I used to have an expensive Cassio watch that did that (minus GPS) and it helped immensely. Smartphones are great, but you need your hands free when climbing. If necessary, the location/gps could be sent to the watch from the phone. Make it waterproof so I could use it while Kayaking as well. I would be willing to pay a large premium for such a watch. Reply

The only segment I believe it will be useful for is for fitness/health. I do not think the utility of a smartwatch will be fully realized until you can stuff the guts of a modern smartphone into the form factor of a watch, a-la Dick Tracy.Reply

With every new technology there is going to be an adoption period. We saw that adoption period starting with computers, then came cellular phones (dumb phones), then smartphones, and now the adoption period is coming to wearable’s. The computer gave us internet access at our homes and work, the dumb phones made it possible for people to get a hold of us when we were not at home or work. The smartphones gave people the ability to conduct work from virtually anywhere with a data connection and sometimes even without a data connection. With the development of wearable technology starting to be adopted more and more these cellular phone accessories will stand to be adopted more easily and used by the masses. The community is at its infancy when it comes to wearables; no one knows what the future holds. What manufactures are starting to do is see where they can expand their market share and the hot topic is wearables. I foresee, in the future having a wearable would be just as common as having a computer or a cellular phone. The idea of being able to give a quick glance at your wrist and know what direction is next in your navigation, how long of time it is until you’re seated for dinner and even which alarm was set off in your home security system is something that saves time and makes life easier. The hardest part with developing new technology is finding people that are capable of developing these expanding technologies. There is also the reality that wearables are not for everyone; however that does not mean that the development and time should not be spent to make good and reliable applications.Reply

I have to agree with a lot of the comments I'm seeing and say healthcare and fitness jump out as two industries that could benefit most from wearables. Monitoring heart rate, providing a timer for things that need done at set intervals like shots or pills, and so on. A wearable is something you'd likely have on at all times.

It could also be very useful to a small business or something where employees might be spread thin. Think getting notifications or having stream video to know when a customer comes in your shop if you don't have line of sight to the main floor.

It would also have applications in security, possibly large retail locations. Being able to tie your existing security to a wearable to aid in thwarting shoplifters and other types of theft.

Currently, wearables is doing very well for the fitness segment. This will keep continuing because people that are into fitness really want to know as much stats as possible in realtime (distance, heart rate, location, steps, speed, etc). This is especially true right now because it seems like the nation as a whole is becoming much more health conscious.

Aside from the health segmet, I see the business segment and the young college student segment taking off. Being able to quickly see emails & texts without having to pull out your phone will appeal to the busy business person. The same would be said for the college student. Also, if what you're wearing is cool & trendy, the college student would definitely save money for that wearable. Reply

Probably the biggest thing I'd want my wearable to do is reduce the number of times I take my phone out of my pocket. The two biggest reasons why I do that are to check the time (obvious wearable function) and to see what notifications are. Being able to read a message while I'm driving would be a huge bonus. Driving becomes difficult when trying to wrestle my phone out of my pocket, unlock it, and swipe down just to see whether or not I can ignore a notification until I'm done driving.It's often mentioned that people want their phones to completely stay in their pocket and for everything to interface with their smartwatch. I think this is unrealistic. It needs to merely be an auxiliary display, similar to the Google Glass concept or Logitech's keyboard LCDs. When my phone is navigating somewhere, give me a compass. When I'm listening to music, give me the song. When I get a message, show it to me. Give me a physical button to tap in to Google's voice search, giving only voice replies. Save me the trouble of wrestling for my phone just to ask Google what "315 miles divided by 12.853 gallons" comes out to (and stop giving me the result in kilometers per litre when I've already provided units of measurement!).

Also, something slightly Star Trek Tricorder-like would be nice. Pick up vitals of the wearer, give me temperature, pressure, humidity, etc from hardware sensors. I'm not expecting spectrum analysis of various rocks, but something akin to a mad scientist's swiss army knife. Bonus points if it makes tricorder sounds (although licensing those might be difficult).

With all that said, I like what smartwatches are right now and where they are going. The current generation looks excellent and I'd love to have one. :)Reply

I think these would be useful in a professional environment so you can get updates and screen calls without pulling out a phone in meetings. Also, a wearable would be useful in any profession where you use both your hands. I can imagine a cook, surgeon, rock climber, dentist, etc finding wearables quite useful.Reply

The most important application would be communication and information lookups. With Health and fitness a close second. I would suspect that in the long run, watches that can completely replace phones (at least on the communications front) would win. Reply

Health/fitness, notifications, and security is where I see wearables excelling in. Health/fitness and notifications are pretty obvious by now but security might not be. A good example I see wearables becoming useful is having the watch alert you when it's paired phone is too far away from it.Reply

I believe a smartwatch will be most successful as a fitness tracker or as a fashion accessory. The reason for the fitness tracker is obvious. It would replace a fuelband and also keep track of many other possible metrics.

A smartwatch is also perfect for fashion. As many people know, fashion changes over time. As such, the traditional watches will always have a traditional look to them. However, smartwatches can have any aesthetic. In addition, smartwatches become obsolete in 2-5 years and as such they would be easy to switch out as new fashion trends arise. As such, smartwatches can follow the fashion industry very closely.Reply

I could definitely see a smart watch as a replacement for those scenarios where I only need to glance at my phone. E-mail/text/alert notifications, calendar, time, phone battery life, GPS/directional navigation. It could also work well as an alternate input button for things like my phone's camera (set it up, walk into shot, press watch).Reply

I can see this being useful in a work environment where emails and meetings are commonplace, yet you find yourself not in front of your computer a lot (for example if you worked in a laboratory that uses lab computers that don't necessarily have your email/appointments readily available).

And of course, this would be handy for the casual user who keeps their phone in their pocket and often misses calls because the ring/vibrate was not heard/felt.Reply

They look nice. For the time being they are a gadget with no particular killer-app; if there's ever going to be a rugged one, I can see some use for quick communication between firefighters, quick responders etc.Reply

Fitness is a no brainer. Gamification of fitness has seemingly proved beneficial, at least for now. And healthcare in general... the more sensors we can get, the more information we get to analyze.

And just having wearable sensors period to track yourself. I don't know what offhand, but I'm sure we can learn a lot (the flip side is there's a huge creepy factor in tracking yourself even moreso than Google does now).Reply

ARM is asking the wrong question. The question should be what kinds of apps are interesting, and the second part of that is "Does it make sense to have a sub-app on the Wearable or just send notifications when needed?" Most apps don't need anything more than the Notification layer of the wearable, and there are plenty of people that are ignoring this and, let's say, making a web browser for the wearable *cough*. While this is a good demonstration, this example is absurd until wearables evolve to be more than the tiny screens they are now.Reply

Would be a great fitness item. It could combine all my various fitness related electronics such as heart rate monitor, GPS, navigation, bike computer etc all into a single device. Plus I just want one.Reply

If you have to ask your watch whether you had a good workout, then you probably didn't have a good workout... I don't think the fitness apps will be anything more than a fad, and most users that actually stick to a regimen for a few months will stop using them.

Having the actual time from your phone and getting text messages will be the useful, but the most important thing is being able to change the color of the face/background to match your outfit! They'd also match your smart glasses and other wearables. Fashion followed by Notifications are #1 & #2, IMO.Reply

I think wearables make sense for security as a key fob. Healthcare devices are getting bigger and notifications for asthma and other medications will see a lot of convenience on the arm. Smart filtering of notifications will go along way to keeping this tool relevant. And fashion will sell it.Reply

I think any environment where you're on the move. Security, nursing, and fitness are all good example. I sit at my desk with my phone face up all day and wouldn't really buy one. But I still WANT one!Reply

In my opinion, wearables will be most successful in fitness and fashion. They're just too small for anything important. I'd want one just because I like watches and it would be fun to experiment with various GUIs. I'm hesitant to actually buy one until they could last all day with the time always on display.Reply

I think wearables would be the most successful in environments where pulling out your phone to check notifications is inappropriate. Like during a movie or maybe driving a car since you just have it on your wrist so it's not as distracting as grabbing your phone.Reply

Healthcare and fitness is where I think wearables will be most successful. Being able to check blood pressure, heart rate, or other diagnostics on the fly trumps being able to check your e-mail or looking cool.Reply

I think wearables have big opportunities in vitals. Whether it be for fitness or health wearables gathering and monitoring a persons vitals opens an immense amount of data to use.Also notifications are another big area. Having something immediately view-able, which does not take up a hand, to show you notification information could be a huge benefit.Reply

I think that location and time dependent notifications are the most interesting applications to me (Google Now). I would like my shopping list to appear on my wrist when I walk in a store, and I want to see traffic and public transportation schedules appear when it's time to leave work.Reply

I would say healthcare is a big field because of the need to record information, but the mobility of a nurse and doctor is important. It's practical for a doctor to carry a tablet, and a smart watch could be a helpful companion device. As for a nurse, something with great power like a smart watch but not requiring a hand to carry around is a big boon. Also, hospitals will have a mesh WiFi network so connectivity is present. Just look at the way tablets (and PCs before them) have proliferated in hospitals recently and you'll see that there's money waiting to be spent for convenience.

Enterprise is another one. You must have a laptop to get any work done, but many times that too much. Or you don't want (or shouldn't!) get it out. Tablets are springing up there, but looks are important mobility is also worth something. Grabbing a phone works in so many scenarios, like checking the daily schedule or an upcoming meeting or replying to a quick email. In those cases, instead of reaching for a phone a smart watch could be helpful. How often do you need to read a moderate email, but the reply can be one word or one sentence? In those cases, a smart watch is perfect. And like healthcare, there is a lot of money that can be spent if the product is truly appealing and marketed well.

Certainly there will be folks who will ride the fashion/fad trend of smart watches. But it's hard to target and reach those folks, while the above cases are more straightforward.Reply

I, too, feel that fitness and notifications are going to be the primary uses for these devices. Personally, I like the idea of turn-by-turn navigation as well, for example while riding a bike. I'd love to win one!Reply

I think communications (specifically, the notifications aspect) is the only use case for a smartwatch that makes real sense. Being able to communicate without taking your phone out of your pocket is a killer function for me.Reply

FITNESS. As an avid cyclist I would absolutely love to be able to glance down at my watch for turn by turn directions, or view my heart rate, or distance traveled, or speed. This technology could finally keep me from having to stop at every turn when riding new routes. Reply

I would be interested in a watch, but I know the first couple of generations I will not be happy with. As far as wearables, general clothes don't make a lot of sense unless they are washable and sensors only. I have no desire to charge more crap. I'd like the battery life to be one to two weeks. I would tolerate daily charging for a kick ass device, but realistically I expect to charge every 1 - 3 days.

My random thoughts below:

I would be interested in watches, but I want my watch to be waterproof, charge and sync wirelessly. I won't tolerate another cable. I like the ability to tell local weather data with built-in sensors. I have a phone and tablet that can tell me the forecast. The forecast would be nice, but not enough. GPS and compass functionality is handy, but should be able to disable and save the juice. Additional solar charging would be fine or some motion charging. The size is feature dependent to me. I draw the line at a device that makes me lean to one side though. I am into fitness and would be interested in accessories that tell my body temperature and pulse in conjunction with the watch. How many mile I have run (I don't run far) and how fast.

I don't think I want cellular built-in at this point. Privacy is getting to be a concern. WiFi and Bluetooth should do the trick. I'd rather not have a camera. I am at odds with the microphone for security/privacy concerns. I live in MN and freezing temperature operation would be pretty interesting to me, yet I know many batteries don't like it.

Applications: I am not sure how far I want notifications. I can say with certainty that I don't want any EFFFin ads -- Google -- on my watch. I am leery about Google being the OS period; they are too smart and they find subtle ways to figure out things about you. I have a mistrust of all the data they collect and analysis. I know Apple does the same things, but I don't find them as smart/crafty - this can obviously change. Yet I am aware that the others aren't much better. I would call Microsoft the best on privacy because they often have an opt-in approach. The EU loves stealing MS's money in court. I use some 2 factor authenticators and this would be a good location for an like that. Cryptocoin payment functionality; not sure about a live wallet though because of robbery. Reminder and alarm syncing with my phone. Call/text notification within a certain range of my phone. I don't care about music on it because I would expect it to sound like crap - laptop speakers already suck. I don't have diabetes, but blood sugar level notification would be pretty damn cool for telling when I have too much carbs or not enough in my diet: the glycemic level.Reply

Fitness maybe - we've already seen some decently successful fitness products, but whether these devices can provide enough data for a comprehensive fitness assessment, or whether they are rugged enough to be worn while exercising remains to be seen.

I think the segments wearables would be most successful in would be communications (notifications) and fitness (things like tracking calories or miles). Would also be nice if it had some functionality separate from the phone it goes with; for example, taking your wearable on a run to play music and leaving the phone behind.Reply

Thanks for the competition! Fingers crossed :)I see wearables as key to productivity in a world full of distractions; reducing the time and attention needed to deal with all the notifications you receive through the day. This should also have the benefit of increasing phone battery life as the screen will be lit up a lot less as you can pre-screen pushes for importance and immediacy. Reply

The ideal segment/application for wearables will vary based on the type of wearable and the interaction mode the hardware presents.

For watches, I really like Google's notification approach. Presenting some basic information and actions on the watch itself with basic taps and swipes, while leaving more advanced interactions for the phone/tablet. I prefer the functionality to remain fairly minimal, which will keep the computing resource requirements low which will allow smaller form factors and/or cheaper prices. Plus, I think it is incredibly smart how the watch hooks into the phone application's notifications, giving this new hardware an large software base on day one.

For the glasses type of wearables, applications need to require much less interaction as it isn't as convenient to be reaching up to touch your head, nor as socially accepting to be using verbal commands. This could require some type of AI to determine what information the user will want to see based on their situation/environment. I think augmented reality will be the killer app. Some obvious examples of this that come to mind are: navigation, facial recognition (I know, Google has shot this down), or location-based information (landmarks, restaurants, building info, etc.). Possibly, hands-free video recording or reference manual information display (e.g. show the car manual page to me while I have my hands busy working on the engine) would be very useful.

What I am really interested in are what other classes of wearables will be created. But I think all wearables should not be considered general computing devices, but provide relatively limited functionality (when compared to phones and tablets) or even single/fixed function devices like the various health monitoring devices.Reply

I think communication would be the best use of this device.Just imagine you were a rogue scientist with a son, some kid you found in India and a body guard who is an ex GQ magazine model. This would be the perfect way to communicate with them.Reply

Fashion. I think wearables can excel in fashion. People are willing to make trade offs for fashion and within those trade offa you can fit in more tech. Of course, eventually the tech will not have trade offs and be able to be as small as possible, but in the mean time if you make fashionable wearables people will be more willing to buy. Reply

I think that communications or notifications will be the first usable segment. With maybe fitness being the carrot that gets your attention. But basically America has some fitness conscious, it is not a fit country. I would just hope that it would be able to last a few days to be useful.Reply

A part for easy concepts, like fitness and notifications, I would say that contextual information will be the core feature that will get the wearable war to be won by the company that provides the best implementation.Reply

The category that smart watches would be most useful in? Information summary basically a quick heads up type display that somehow conveys a lot of info in a single glance at the wrist. Second would be a fitness device assuming it has the proper sensors built in for this...Reply

Smart watches/devices would probably work best in IT, infrastructure, security, and fitness spaces. As an IT person, I rely on my Pebble Smartwatch for service interruption notifications and important emails without having to pull out my phone continuously throughout the day.Reply

I think the two most popular uses/applications for wearables will be fitness tracking (e.g. fitbit style) and notifications/second-screen for a smartphone. I can't imagine ever actually using a watch to order food, or book a flight, but I love the idea to use the screen as my boarding pass, or check on package delivery, etc.Reply

i believe smart watches will turn into smart sensing devices, not only sensing your body, but also the surrounding environment. Air quality, pollens, keeping a track of where i lost my book, people I met today. I think it will be just one node in an array of sensors a person in future will be carrying on his body.Reply

I am looking forward to a smart watch fitness device. Especially a device that could useful for hiking. This would then need to be a device with a looong battery life (carging by solar/movement would be ideal), it would also need gps and navigation, and have the capability to track time and distance accurately.

What might differentiate this from something else already on the market is the ability for advanced navigation and predictions as well as integrated nutrition and health tracking.Reply

Fitness and by extension healthcare are obvious fits for wearables, but hopefully platforms like Android Wear will help them expand into smartphone fields like communication. They can also be useful as one element in a multi-factor authentication system, or simply as a trusted bluetooth device to avoid having to type your password into your phone all the time.Reply

Definitely fitness/healthcare: Having vital sensors to train at the body's max for best efficiency.Second security: Using the watch to unlock my apartment, car, computer, other stuff. A hint of this was demonstrated in the Google IO keynote.Reply

Blackberry's became popular because they were synonymous with being a successful business(wo)man. Likewise, Nike running shoes are popular because they are synonymous with being healthy and fit. In that same vein, smartwatches would take off if they linked themselves with a positive and desirable lifestyle/theme. Like others have said, the fitness/health market seems like the obvious segment to market to first. There are clear advantages--if smartwatches are marketed for on-the-go use, you can't get more on-the-go than excercise. People want to associate themselves with that image of being fit, and if marketed properly, smartwatches could become the new symbol of fitness. Reply

I would say 5 major fields: 1. communication: this could be a very compact form of a phone with quite a bit of capability. 2. healthcare: this could be used as a medical band that can inform medical personnel of what medications, ailments, and even basic vitals of the person. 3. security: this could function as a tracking mechanism and alert police and first responders to your location 4. fitness: there's a lot here, mostly gps tracking, heart rate, etc. Reply

As a person with diabetes I am excited by the prospect of coupling this wearable with Google's glucose sensing contact lens. There are so many times I would like to see my blood sugar but don't want to see it badly enough to prick my finger and draw some blood. A continuous monitor on my wrist would be incredible if it were accurate.Reply

I think smartwatches will be most successful in sports/training situations and in social situations, both of which make uisng a smartphone difficult, and of course provided that the smartwatch can make and receive calls and use GPS without being tethered to a smartphone.Reply

How about the mobile payment segment? Throw NFC in one of these and it could interface rather nicely with Google Wallet and similar apps. That way, you wouldn't have to pull out your wallet or phone to pay. Just tap your wrist and have a payment confirmation show up on the watch screen. It could even prompt you for a PIN on the watch.Reply

I was looking for a product like this to use at my work. I work in an environment that requires me take calls hands-free and because my hands are often dirty from the machinery I work with, I don't like to handle my phone to check who is calling me. This would work well in my current work flow. Would love to test this product out. Send me one please!Reply

Although I feel that wearables such as watches are too limited to fully replace a smartphone, I can definitely see how they could be discreet and effective health trackers. In addition I could imagine wearables being used as a security device, as it is much harder to lose then a traditional smartphone and could be for example, utilized as a digital key.Reply

In our hospital we use smartphones to receive text pages and make calls, which is very convenient. However, we're often in situations where we can't reach into our pockets to look at a message (sterile procedure, isolation room, etc). Sometimes a nearby colleague has to awkwardly reach into a pocket to pull a phone out. It'd be nice to check a message with the turn of a wrist to see whether it requires immediate attention or can wait a few minutes. I don't need something to replace my smartphone, just sync with it and reliably relay messages.Reply

the biggest reason I want to get a smart watch would be so that I don't have to constantly take my phone out to read a message, dial a number and thing like that. another place would be in fitness. a heart rate monitor is something that I would love to have in a watch because I hate wearing a chest strap while exercisingReply

In addition I would add that wearable's need to add to the experience by either doing something better than your phone or expanding functionality. I'm personally looking forward fitness integration more than anything.Reply

I would love get my hands on one of these (or get one of these on my wrist)! I am a huge fan of LG (TV's, BD-Rom drives, tablets, etc.). The only complaint I have against LG was my T-Mobile G2X. It was one of the first Tegra2 phones, and yet only the Optimus 2X (which is the same exact phone with a different radio and slightly tweaked internal partition) was upgraded past Android 2.3. All they needed to do was release an ICS driver, and I'd be living the high-life with a CM10 phone.

I think general healthcare would be the way to go. I mean with all the recent child deaths in hot vehicles; having something that can ping their parent's cell or whatever device to remind them would be useful.Reply

1. Driving safety. With good voice recognition and a little engineering, wearables with constant listening will help drivers keep more of their attention on the road. Naturally, glasses can act as a driving HUD. Distracted driving is a big issue nowadays, so this could really help people until self-driving cars truly mature.

2. Military applications. For infantry, I can see smart glasses sharing detailed info between troops with a HUD. For example, the glasses could overlay a green tint on friendly troops who are also using glasses or a watch. One troop could tap into another troop's camera to see what they're seeing. Or maybe they could tap into a drone feed for an overhead perspective.

Some of the above ideas could also be incorporated into civilian applications like search and rescue, fire departments, etc.Reply

I see these watches being most successful for fitness. I'd like to use one with runkeeper. Secondly I expect the watches to be big in security. e.g. to unlock a door or device based on proximity. Reply

I think that wearables could end up big in the enterprise because it's much more of a distraction to pull your phone out and look at the notification rather than just looking at your watch and seeing if it's important or not.Reply

Fitness would be good, but I think increasing everyday productivity would be nice. I pull my phone out of my pocket just to glance at things all the time. If I could just turn my wrist to achieve the same effect, that would be nice. It's not a huge difference, but it adds up. Reply

While fitness is useful, I would find it most useful in day-to-day use as an information conduit (weather, quick-glance calendar, email notifications). I believe there is also a strong use-case for modifying behavior using apps (with notifications and such), but that's not likely mainstream utilityReply

Fitness seems to be the logical choice. I don't see an enterprise use since I believe most enterprise users would have a phone, tablet and laptop available at all times and those would provide a larger screen and potentially better input.Reply

I think this could be useful if integrated into a warehouse environment, the watch could help the employee find the next items to be picked. You could also use the watch to help the worker locate free space to place items.

Maybe in a restaurant for cooks to glance at their arms to see that they need to make next.

The device could be a good up time monitor, alerting the wearer of some serous issue. It could be a website going down, a security alarm, or a medical patients vital signs.Reply

I think wearables would be interesting in the DIY (do it yourself) segment for just about anything. Showing instructions in simple card format, swiping left and right for each step (forward or backward).

This can be applied to Cooking, Engineering, working on your car, DIY electronics, Fixing Computers, virtually anything really.

Another concept would be in enterprise. Reminders for meetings, TPS reports :D, schedules, and emails could enhance productivity and be less disruptive during meetings.

in gaming segment, high scores and friends score compare could be streamed to the watch at the completion of a level.

I work in a chem laboratory and my hands are often contaminated and not in a state where I'd like to be touching anything.

I think these could do very well in any discipline where the use of your hands somehow forces you to document things through voice command and be able to quickly recall that information(by simply raising/rotating your wrist). The most prominent that comes to mind would be Culinary.Reply

As a watch, style is by far the most important thing. Whatever features it has are ok, but it has to look good on your wrist for it to be a hit. Look at Movado watches for example, all looks with limited function.Reply

First of all, multiple day battery life is a must. As far as a segment, I'd like to focus on productivity and easy integration with my everyday life - like my info/control of my car or keeping up with my significant other or use with connected devices (garage door opener, nest, lights)Reply

In time this might become a replacement for smartphones entirely. One small ultra-portable communication device that you carry everywhere, paired occasionally with a larger screen (a tablet or whatever technology replaces them) when content consumption is desired.Reply

I think the 'watch' in 'smartwatch' is steering development in the wrong direction. The industry should develop a standardized activity (as in the android framework object, google it). This would open up options for developers. It would be nice to keep the 'smartwatch' form factor, minus the wrist band. If market demand enables these cube devices to sell for $50, they'll take off. Btw I recently got an LG G3...Reply

I've been on the fence about getting one of these.I think wearables are most useful for fitness and communication, and for getting helpful at-a-glance contextual information based on time/location/etc.Reply

Most successful? I think sports/medical primarily. Reflecting the calendar in an office environment is also great (quick look at the watch rather than fiddling with the bulky phone), but that is probably too much of a niche...Reply

I feel that wearables would excel in providing detailed health monitoring (such as heart rate, pulse, etc.), as well as being able to communicate on a simple level (ie: ask google for the weather forecast and the watch, with a speaker, would be able to tell you), as well as provide simple notifications, easy access to said notifications, and to be able to have light control of your phone to play music and other things.

Using the watch as a speakerphone or headset to carry on a conversation isn't professional. Beyond looking stupid by talking to your watch, it takes away the privacy of a conversation. Yes, if you are in public, you should NOT expect to be able to carry on a private conversation, but my rebuttal is, do people have speakerphone conversations on a regular basis now? I would say no. But that's exactly what will start happening if you have a conversation on a smartwatch.

My mom has been staying with us while she undergoes cancer This means that she has a lot of meds she needs to take at different times of the day. Problem is, her mind is a little fried. I guess they call it chemo-brain. So she's set up these really convoluted alarms on her clock to try and remember what she needs to take when.

I think something like the G Watch would be ideal for someone like her so she can set different alarms on her phone and have hem on her wrist, telling her which meds she needs, when, and have multiple times it can go of. She wouldn't even need her phone on her at the time, so long as she was near it.Reply

I'd say that as it stands right now, fitness and fashion would make up most market share for this sort of device. You can look good or do the occasional fitness/health monitoring, but it just wouldn't work well enough in things like business or security. If you're consistently checking the watch, you aren't doing a very good job of keeping an eye out for what you're actually supposed to be looking for right? And just too much information has to stream through in a business environment for it to be practical. The volume of emails, meeting arrangements, and other such activities is hard enough to manage with a phone, let alone a watch. It why most business activities need at least a small laptop because it just ends up being more efficient, albeit more bulky.Reply

sci-fi for the win. I would really like a PA slash com hub for a wearable. No need to carry all the variety of device we carry around in the name of necessity. cell phone, wifi internet, personal data, computer, all of these need to be rolled up into one wearable. One ring to bind them all.Reply

I think the LG G Watch is really cool and my suggestions as to what I think would be really great to have in the G Watch in my opinion would be security apps for people like me who have home security cameras, and fitness app like Runtastic so we aren't so bothered by our phones. I love the concept of smart watches and I thought it was really cool that it was really cool to know that the LG G Watch is running a new OS. I would also like to be able to connect it to my phone to get all my notifications.Reply

I would think that bracelets/watches for esthetic purposes for normal wear and Google Glass type sunglasses with HUD type screens on the lenses would be the likely form factors to have a chance of success. I think that it's going to take one more generation to get the style/activation/power draw kinks worked out to where wearables will be truly useful.Reply

I would love to have one of these to use as my schedule keeper.For something this small be great to keep your schedule on and make quick notes. Then there is just the great Geek feature also, once everyone see's this they will run out to get one to.Reply

I think one segment where wearables would be important is in communication, possibly in situations where your cellphone is not allowed or is just inconvenient, you could possible use your smartwatch for instant messaging or communication between yourself and another person.Reply

Would love to win one of these. ARM one app idea RSA softtoken ability from watch face would be amazing for those who use RSA daily and can replace hard tokens .. Capability to unlock a PC (or server or similar) by way of proximity of watch to the machine (add layer of security by also require a PIN for more security). Also I would love to have a speaker on the watch in the future to take calls as well as dictate actions. Incorporating some secure element to the watch by hardware could launch this device into the enterprise world in my opinion. Hoping for a win :) thanksReply

Honestly, no idea if/where these watches will be successful. The concept is neat and definitely warrants exploration, which is why I'd like to win one, but it doesn't seem like the killer app has been sussed out yet.Reply

I see smart watches really taking off as a fashion accessory. While they may be convenient for communication/ social media, many people don't need them for convenience's sake as they already take their phones with them everywhere they go. However, if smart watches can become a trendy fashion accessory, I think they will find their niche. Just look at the recent boom in colorful branded headphone sales for proof of concept.Reply

I think wearables would be useful in the fitness segment. They already contain most of the necessary hardware to be a useful tracker. Syncing to a heart rate monitor would be the only useful addition I could see. Reply

A crossover of fitness and music. A lot of people Walk/go jogging with a pair of headphones plugged into their ears; listening to music. However, as phones are getting bigger, they don't seem practical to take with you while you walk or jog. This way, wearables will make it to the market successfully if they have enough storage and a music app! Reply

To me the size the of the screen is going to be a deciding factor. Its nice check time weather and alerts on the phone. People with smaller hands might be able to do more on it. I look at it as being a fashion thing for teenagers then really a Enterprise or business solution. In today's world security is this biggest thing for businesses. If thieves can scan ur wallet passing by u and get ur credit card number this will be a field day for hackers to get all kinds of info from ur phone. NFC is not a secured technology but credit card companies don't want people to know it because if they knew they won't use them and they have invested a lot of money in it so people can go out and shop without swiping their cards. My take on this watch, its for kids. Some older people will buy it as a fashion statement then it will die. I see google glass doing a lot better.Reply

Healthcare and fitness I think is where the biggest chances of success are. With heart rate, sweat detection, breathing detection, thermometer, and maybe even blood-ox then these devices would be HUGE for 24/7 monitoring of people with medical conditions. There already exists devices that can detect all of those things just from your fingertips. Hell, but some of the technology in the band if you can't make it all work on the watch. Program pill reminders with pictures of the exact pills so that they have a detailed alert right on their person that shows them exactly what they should be doing at that moment. These things can quite literally become the ultimate (so far) personal health monitor system that there is. And then of course being able to communicate to a computer/tablet/smartphone to share the data with healthcare professionals or just view trends would absolutely shatter the technology barrier between that exists between people who are 65+ and smart devices. Hell, buddy up with Life Alert and have a Life Alert version that has a button they can press if they are in distress. Also add a "Help me find home" feature that phones in the police so that they can take them home.

For fitness nuts.... well fitness nuts love tracking every metric possible. Give them an easy way to track a ton of metrics, and they will gobble it up, even if the metric isn't terrible important to exercise (skin sweat levels). Temperature, breathing detection, blood-ox, gps, heart rate, plus received text messages automatically pop up, voice-to-text replying to text messages, apps that allow you to easily set routines and lengths for them that will automatically tell you when to stop your current exercise, how long to rest between the next exercise, and when to start the next one. Basically like a mini-personal-trainer almost.

Those two markets, I think, are where the most possibility is. Only problem is, will a company actually implement something like these correctly? Or will some executive insist on a half-ass product be release like they normally do?Reply

The greatest potential is in Healthcare. I wear an analog watch daily which I use for pulse & respiratory rate measurement. I also have to constantly pull out my phone to look up drug dosage, treatment guidelines etc. Patients take much more kindly to me looking at my watch, than at my phone. In their view, doctors use watches for work, but if they use their phone, they're just texting or browsing the web. It would be great if Google Now (or Cortana) using a third-party healthcare platform like HealthVault or HealthKit preemptively provided me contextual info on each patient as I interact with them. It could do this using anonymous demographic & statistical info or securely using protected personal info. Even if it just let me use my voice to record vitals and any 'notes to self', it would be invaluable. The best part is, it wouldn't creep the patient out like Google Glass might. One hopes that these devices all go cross-platform though. I have an iPhone & a Surface, my colleague uses a Moto X & a MacBook, an EKG tech uses a Lumia & a Thinkpad. At the moment, it looks like wishful thinking though!Reply

I think smart watches + health care apps would be a good way to drive adoption. People tend to look at their watches when they need info (the time/date), not to use frivolous apps. Those can stay on those phones, or I hope they will.Reply

Like everyone else I would love to win! I think healthcare is where the focus should be on wearables like this. I hope there is a day where you could check glucose levels easily using something like a G watch. Reply

Right now wearables are very niche, and the barrier to entry is too high for mass market consumption. I believe that they could find great utility in the medical field, where the cost won't be an issue, right now until the technology matures.Reply

Sure, I'd like to have one. For my purposes, it would probably be most useful for remote monitoring of my phone for e-mail and message notifications and operational things like the phone's battery charge.Reply

I believe that the andriod wear watches will be successful in fitness, but it strongest cavit is its ability to multi-task. How awesome is it to read your email, see a text, and launch Google now, all while running and no need to pull out your phone? I think the potential is excellent!Reply

Fitness is the most likely segment at first because it is already an established use for watches and GPS integration and music control are really helpful. Long run I see communication (email headers, weather, etc) being the main use.Reply

cool, hope i win! i think wearables will be most successful in the fitness and health tracking segments. fitness because there are all kinds of sensors besides watches that can collect data during activites. health tracking is related but the more data that is collected the better it can help uncover indicators of health issues. like a tricorder! nice.Reply

Theirs a realm of options available for these devices. These are a few I feel need to happen within a reasonable time to make them relevant. (outside the normal notification, email stuff, wifi.. etc)

#1. No Ports.. no holes, no charging slots (back opens up to change battery and SD card, but then seals water tight)- Water proof at depths comparable to Casio's best watches.- QI charging, and comes with its own mini pad that clamps on the back of watch, that then plugs into a USB port for desktop or car charging- heart rate monitoring and/or the host of different Ant + modules- NFC ( NFC unlocking capabilities )- basic MMS with SOLID voice recognition capabilities (no onscreen keyboard, this thing needs its own voice processor)- Google Play Music integration/sync - I don't expect it to have 4G capabilities, but if when connected to wifi, it could download songs to play offline in playlists from google Play Music (along with separate SD card storage)- google maps - lite - GPS support (perhaps 2 different editions could be made, one to support GPS on board, and another without)- GPS distress beacon ... optional, but its time- NEST support and Home automation- **** built in PTT (push to talk) app such as TiKL .I realize this would require a data connection of some sort, but if this were supported natively, this would sufficiently give me the ability to contact someone vocally without needing phone capabilities.

To keep this device from becoming another " gadget with data plan", the carriers or manufacturers could strike a deal with other carriers to provide free/throttled 3G (similar to the kindle) to the device when not on Wifi.

May be a long laundry list of items, but definitely doable. A big one that I think should be mentioned is Durability. Get Casio to make this watch life proof and sell different watches for different purposes. Give me a big green combat ready version with an arm cuff looking thing (similar to that which the predator has) for outdoors, and sleek fashionable versions (still life proof). I don't think anything on this list is outside the realm of possibility. I just don't want to need to carry my Phablet note 3 everywhere (biking, hiking, swimming etc) . Reply

I'd love to see NFC or Low-Energy Bluetooth incorporated into new smartwatches. With the advances made in "The Internet of Things," it would be awesome to control all of a house's devices from a watch on my wrist. Imagine reaching out to open a network-equipped door lock and have it spring open on detecting your smartwatch. Reply

I think wearables will have a home run in communications. After seeing some demos I can see many people picking one up just to answer/send texts and phone calls. I also see a huge potential in the fitness side of things if the right sensors and creative development are involved.Reply

I think this type of product is a natural for all types of fitness apps. That is what I would be most interested from, to pedometers and heart rate monitors to apps showing calories burned based on user info. I'm excited to see what's available out there.Reply

I think wearables will be useful in minimizing the need to pull out my phone to get basic information or even answer a call. I also think the wearable could be used for thngs like home automation and medical monitoring for things like EKG wireless monitors on individuals who have had multiple mini-strokes or possibly even sezures. Wireless monitoring by doctors offices. The initial ideas are endless. Pretty exciting really.Reply

I think wearables would be most useful in just our day-to-day lives. Maybe one day they'll be useful enough to replace our smartphones and we'll move to Watch + Tablet instead of Phone + (Tablet or PC)Reply

I think these will prove most useful for fitness, at least that's how I envision myself using it. Calories, heartrate, pace, etc.. Also like the idea of glancing at messages/emails without having to pull out my phone.Reply

Honestly, I tink thhis G Watch will be used for Fitness for the most part. People generally useb arm-wear tech for fitness related aspects. Other than that, another large percentage of people will just buy this product as something to show off to family and friends.Reply

One to win. I would have to say the benefit for such a device is for people that small short messages will be useful for. Personally I don't see the value thus far at least for the watch type devices. Google Glass has more potential in my mind. Say for people needing access to information while their hands are working on things.Reply

I see wearables being particularly successful in commercial and health tracking scenarios. A smartwatch would be a perfect companion to a busy business person by keeping track of their meetings, commutes, and emails. Wearables with active heartrate monitors and GPS monitors would be fantastic for runners and cyclists. I see them being very successful in the future!Reply

Health and watches go hand in hand. if I can use a digital device to track tasks, meetings, and my heart rate all for the success of my job with some reliance, then sign me up for that watch! Keep it simple and smart. Reply

This is awesome. I think that it would be great with fitness, hiking, biking,. Great apps would be Facebook, email, Pandora or other radio apps, maybe a game out two, maps of some sort, find your phone, maybe even take a pic if eventually in the future, to start your car apps, so much to say.. I can go ramble on. Reply

I'd definitely be interested in using this as a silent alarm clock. Keeping my phone in my pocket I typically lose a lot of notifications for meetings. So all in all, using this to supplement Google Calendar would be a huge benefit.

The other area I'd want make good use of this is with Fitness. I'm very interested in a product that can track my heart rate and keep stats throughout the day. With a desk job I don't tend to burn the calories I typically did as a kid. Time management is a huge issue after work as well. But long term I'd be able to track my eating habits through apps while it also logs my activity.

So honestly, this can help stream line my time management between staying fit, work schedule, and family life.

It certainly wouldn't come off as rude or as intrusive checking my watch vs. giving full attention to my phone while with a group of people.Reply

I'd like to see these watches used as a pilot's watch. Barometer, GPS, multiple timers and countdowns would be helpful. Calculator might be unworkable on the watch but with speech recognition and a smartphone, it would work.Reply

This watch is a God send for college students and college teachers who have a variable schedule perhaps in different buildings. I see it's also good for fitness buffs. While it's always nice to own and use the latest, greatest technology, this watch is fabulous because it is so practical and useful while not sacrificing style.Reply

I think fitness is obvious, along with notifications. Also "light controls" meaning providing a way to interact with applications in a reduced set of functions is another. For example being able to play/pause your music app, being able to ask for the next direction from navigation, and being able to set/dismiss an alarm from a wearable all makes sense. Reply

Certainly the wearable willneed to fulfill all expected basic functions of the smartphone from a communications standpoint. After that, and thinking of the future, maybe get people used to using navigation applications on it...or anything similar to prepare them for driverless cars or more effective use of mas transit...like I can call up my google car, or an uber. Reply

They will be very important to healthcare, so that physicians can be contacted by something newer than pagers. Fashion and healthcare because studies show people who use a fitness tracker are more likely to actually exercise. Reply

I see smart watches being more capable in the social era of things in the fact that people might stop interrupting each to check their phones. They'll have a watch to quickly glance and worry about later. Texting isn't supposed to be immediate, that's what calling is for. Hope to win it! Reply

The best use for a wearable device is to help authenticate yourself with you surroundings. Being able to walk in a room and the lights come on, approach your car at night, the lights come on the doors unlock. This is where the market should go, inexpensive bands that communicate with your surroundings. They need to get the location awareness, first than add other features over time. i would like to see a band with a detachable "watch face", where the band can be replaced with what ever sensors you would need or want.Reply

Wearables would be successfull in on the go and harsh environments where you can't take out you phone, like construction zones, wearing a waterproof smartwach while riding a motorcycle, wearables with extra sensors could assist users in environment sensitive applications Reply

Thanks for the giveaway. As far as I can see now (which means the future will be awesomely unpredictable!) for me, fitness, communication and self management will be the most useful to me. In the immediate future, most particularly fitness and health.

I think mobile payments will really take off if it was properly implemented in smart watches. I also think it will be a great way to get some sort of real time score updates for the upcoming NFL season !!Reply

As a health care professional, I can certainly see some benefits there. Being able to check heart rates (with permission, of course) and monitor could really help some people. The device could work like Lifealert or something of the sort. Beyond that, the primary purpose I can see would be (personally) to let me know when I have an incoming communication / event and see what it is without having to pull the phone out. Would keep the phone out of sight unless needed, but still be able to be on top of communication... unlike now where I tend to ignore when I'm around people, driving some friends up the wall ;-)Reply

If these things could do GPS with topo maps that are stored on the device, it would be awesome for hiking/backpacking/mountain biking. With a high resolution screen and good battery life, something this compact and lightweight would be great.Reply

I have a blue-collar job where I am often not near the (shared) computer and it is often awkward to check my phone often -- making a wearable interface a good idea. A good application would be a reminder app to take water breaks, that would be more frequent when the local temperature is higher, or when my personal activity (pedometer?) is higher. Or perhaps a ticker/counter app to help keep track of stock counts, or a "speed-dial" button to send a notification message to other people in the company when a shipment comes in, rather than run around to find a (shared) phone or computer.Reply

This could be Awesome! I could see it being really handy in security. Imagine a smart watch that would broadcast a small NFC to unlock doors. Perhaps it could be a way to input a PIN without using a large keypad that could be viewed from many angles. Reply

I would love one of these. :) I'm getting an LG G3 on Friday. Talk about a perfect companion! I have a Qualcomm Toq Smartwatch already, but I broke the screen, and Qualcomm refuses to let me send it in, so I refuse to use their product any longer. Reply

I think security is the best implementation of this! You wanna log into email/steam/phone etc. you have to have the watch! It could pop up a little screen asking you to confirm the login. kinda like the 2-step verification on google but without the stupid sms messages. I'd love to have one of these and be part of making that system!Reply

Oooh pretty. I think the Segment they will do best with is people who are prioritizing and juggling a great deal of things at the same time and need to keep updated at a glance. So all segments, but business and technology where they're stuck in meetings in particular.Reply

Wearables could be very useful in the medical field. Nurses could have them linked to their patients and receive alerts immediately with any unexpected issues, or allow them to check in on patients without disturbing them.Reply

I would expect that the most viable segments that the wearables will be successful in are healthcare and fitness as both of these are areas where a wearable can offer a significant advantage over existing smartphones due to their very nature of being "worn" directly on your person.

First off, believe it or not, telling time is most important. After that, meetings and to dos I think will be key. I would love to have health apps but that will probably more the iwatch space. I think things like door unlocking, payment scanning etc., could be useful....Reply

For me, tracking News, Incoming Texts & Emails, Id'ing phone callers and Time display would be the dominant value, but I could imagine Map displays while walking city streets as useful too. NO games, however, and minimal data-entry by voice or screen.Reply

I see this as good for health/fitness of course, but also as an extension to a device that may be in a backpack, for example, allowing communications, authentication and other "smart" features such as environmental controls.Reply

The market would be on extension of the mobile phone. Being able to see needed information (news, sms, phone #) without pulling out the phone is the future with phone size growing larger and larger.Reply

Wearables will be most successful in short communications (think text messages) and enterprise (think having all your meeting information in one spot).

But, wearables will fail in their current configuration. The requirement to (A) have a smart phone and (B) carry two devices around with you at all times kills the deal for almost anyone. Simply removing the need to reach into your pocket to get your smartphone is NOT enough justification to purchase / carry around / charge an additional device.

A successful wearable would remove those two requirements. Image an enterprise wearable device that updates you of a meeting change when you have no access to a computer and when you are in the middle of a large commercial building with no cell phone signal. The ability to know changs to a meeting room / time / purpose on-the-fly where cell phone service is non-existant could make or break major projects. That is invaluable and a truely new reason with new capabilities to have a wearable. All you need is a wearable with wi-fi capability that checks once a minute or so for updates to Microsoft Outlook. That simple change to current wearables doesn't require a massive device and it doesn't kill a battery. And it doesn't require a smartphone that is often useless inside a big building since cell singals don't reach many locations.Reply

Wearables... I think at some point they'll be ubiquitous (after they become sufficiently cheap, useful, and fashionable). They'll probably catch on first in fitness, though. Right now, that's the only market segment where they seem useful.Reply

I am rather skeptical about smartwatches. i think wearables do have a future, but i'm not sure it's smartwatches. although i'll hopefully try an LG G watch to test that out.for what it's worth, fitness and healthcare seem like the two very obvious places where wearables will be successful. another possible segment is home monitoring/automation, with smart sensors in the house, that is. productivity/enterprise and such do not really seem like viable markets -- a wearable should be mostly a latent deviceReply

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Definitely, wearables will most succeed in being a notification system between our devices. Notifications for calendar, communications (phones, sms), and navigation; things which our smart phones and tablets already do well in but the user has access at a glance.Reply

Notifications are the current obvious answer. With sleeker wearables they could make it in the corporate world where it would be better to see meeting reminders without looking at your phone.

I don't know if it'll be possible without having a huge phone, but I'd like to see NFC incorporated into wearables. If NFC was properly incorporated into a watch it could be awesome. It would obviously hinge on other companies following along and adapting NFC into their services, but it would be great. Imagine paying for anything with just a tap of your wrist. For those in a city, getting onto the subway with just your watch would be slick. If we had NFC in our watches, we wouldn't need it on our phones... so even the Apple users could finally take advantage of NFC tech. Reply

I imagine consumer wearables will do best as a fashion accessory for the tech-conscious, mostly in watch form, but I see Google Glass type devices being useful in the enterprise industries as a HUD.Reply

I'd love a g-watch. I've been excited about android wearables for a while now. I think a really interesting application application is in aggregating sensor data from either watch, phone or both for activity monitoring (sleep, workout, etc)Reply

I think the wareables market is still looking for The killer app. The great thing is the smart phone is as well. I think that will be instrumental in the wearable market. The problem with wearable technology is that most people don't like the knowledge that they're being watched, listened to, or monitored in general. I think looking at this the real opportunity will come when someone takes these and makes them invisible. Not literally but in looking at UI designs, some of the most effective are the ones you don't need to think about. Looking at it that way I think it's best if it only "responds" visually when it's oriented facing the user. Slight vibrations to get attention. Audible only with things you deem to be a high priority.That's the real trick - anyone who's had an assistant, staff, or anything similar can tell you that the relationship works best when they know HOW and WHEN to help you.

By "how" I mean, are you missing meetings because appointments run long or because you're running late. Each has a similar end result, but the way you'd like to be notified would be different.

That'd tie into the "when" part. You're late for your next meeting... but it's because you're still in the one prior. You, likely, don't want a loud beeping messing up whatever you're doing. A gentle tap on the wrist, however, is a nice heads up that doesn't intrude.

That's the best use case. It's best fit is as an extension of a smart phone meant to interact with a person in a nonintrusive manner. Displaying simple information that gets the point across.Reply

In the short term fitness seems the most practical application, then if size can be further reduced, battery increased, and display improved, fashion may keep wearables strong. Ultimately there will need to be new utility that people can derive from having the wearable.Reply

I would love to win this for my husband. He has been in the military for 20 years and he is always on the firing ranges and other locations where he can't carry much. I think many military guys would like to have a device like this that is lightweight and useful.Reply

Don't know if anyone actually reads these... but:I would like motion based remote control of various electronics: TVs, AC, lights, and obviously computers. Accelerometer for large motions, and possibly an electro sensor in the watch or band to detect finger motions for things like air taps and pinches.Reply

To be fair, "wearables" will have to include devices like Glass - only then will they start to do more than just be "fancy watches" or "dick tracy phones". The eventual goal is somewhere in the neighborhood of an on-body network that acts primarily as a memory aid, or a fitness tracker, or a communication (read: translation) device. If you're willing to add some specialized cameras (near-infrared, UV), you can expand into some very interesting fields (archaeology, botany, healthcare, ...)

Basically, it's going to become a professional accessory, more than the smartphone accessory of today.Reply

It can become a professional accessory. It can be used for important task lists, memory aids, trip reminders. It can be a medical aid to monitor heart rate, blood pressure, etc. It can be used for fitness to monitor heart rate, calories burned, etc.If it has cameras it can include active scanning for example help with plan care. Reply

I personally would like to see more inter-device connectivity in the fitness realm. And all of this walled garden BS really gets in the way of enjoyability. Let me have Company A's smartwatch display my heart rate from Company B's sensor while showing my speed from Company C's smartphone and cadence from Company D please.Reply

I find that wearables could be big in the enterprise, where there is potentially a real use case scenario. Case in point. It's entirely possible for workflow items that need approval could be processed quickly and easily via a watch card app. Other use case scenarios would be additional authentication to secure areas.Reply

I failed to put the applications I think this will be most successful in when I commented before so here I go:

I think that wearables will become so widespread that no single application would be more successful then any other. They will be the next call phone or smart phone. They may start smaller in a few specific fields such as healthcare or security but they will eventually be ubiquitous....Reply

I think wearable technology it would be most useful in services such as firefighters, police and hospitals. Patients could be given a watch to help with remembering to take medication or doctor appointments. I use my phone to remember appointments and i depend on it for birthdays. But sometimes you just put your phone down and.... well its missing for a few hours.Reply

fitness is probably the most useful application in general for wearables, for watches in particular it would be nice to be able to control music and track progress of a run without having to fumble around with my phone. Reply

Battery life! Please make these last more than a day. On the software side, just make it open enough that anyone with an app can easily utilize it! Lastly, make managing what apps can utilize it from your phone easy to manage. Thanks! Would love to win one!Reply

I already have a Sony Smartwatch 2 and find that other than a conversation piece it has little value. I would like to see a garage door opener function, remote automobile starter app., or something usefull.Reply

I think they could have a great place in fitness, but they will need a bit more before they become truly useful. They need the ability to do some functions without a primary device. Tracking a run, listening to music, etc. shouldn't have to be done through a primary device.Reply

Healthcare is most likely the segment that wearables would be most successful in. Having the ability to more effortlessly monitor your health metrics (blood pressure, heart rate, skin temperature, etc.) with a device that's always on your person could open the door to many advances in personal technology. I can even see the potential for saving lives: a traffic accident could be detected by combining data from an accelerometer, causing the wearable to prompt the wearer to verify if they are injured. Failure to respond could initiate an emergency call to the paramedics, with the GPS location giving responders the location of the incapicated person.Reply

The rules in every contest say the winner will be announced on the website, but I've never found where they list winners of past giveaways and I've never seen any kind of announcement regarding the drawing. Sure would be nice if they updated the article with that info, or at least provided a link to where the winners are listed.Reply

Would love to win one of these. Personally, I find the idea of wearables most attractive for scheduling and keeping my day together, along with their possible uses as quick remotes and media control devices. Reply

I think that the communication and healthcare would be the strongest points of wearable. Of course there is no limit due to huds and gps and other technology. But imagine a diabetic being able to check his or her blood sugar with the watch compared to having to test themselves daily.Reply